The son of Lisa Edwards , the 60-year-old woman who collapsed in Knoxville police custody last year and later died, has filed a federal lawsuit asserting Edwards should not have been discharged from a local hospital and her removal by police exacerbated her poor health.
The lawsuit filed Feb. 1 in federal court names three officers later disciplined by the Knoxville Police Department, Fort Sanders Regional Medical Center and its owner Covenant Health, and Shield and Buckler Security and the security guards it employed.
Edwards was arrested Feb. 5 outside Fort Sanders shortly after she was discharged and asked the leave the premises by hospital staff. She had sought treatment for abdominal pain and suffered from chronic respiratory illness. A security guard had taken her in a wheelchair, wearing paper scrubs in freezing temperatures, to a hospital parking lot. Police were called when Edwards refused to leave.
Police videos show she begged for medical help. The officers repeatedly yelled at Edwards, told her she was faking her condition and ignored her cries for help, and struggled to try to put her into a police van. Ultimately, officers put Sanders in the back of a squad car to be taken to jail. When the officer stopped along a highway to help another driver, he discovered Edwards slumped over in back. She died at a hospital soon after.